Monday, February 22, 2016

YAKSHAGANA - CHANDRAHASA CHARITRE

Sunday, 21st February 2016
In memory of Late Shri GopalaKrishna Adiga, poet, literary person on his 99th birth anniversary, "Shivarama Karantha Vedike" R T Nagara, Bengaluru organized program with lectures in the morning and Yakshagana in the afternoon on Sunday 21st February 2016 at TaralaBalu Centre, R T Nagara, Bengaluru.

It was fantastic performance of Yakshagana- "ChandraHasa Charitre" of 3 hour presentation with famous Kalavidaru. Keshava Hegade Kolagi was Bhagavatharu, Vishwanatha Bhat on Maddale was excellent.

In the main characters, Sudhindra Holla as DishtaBuddhi has performed extremely well, be it nrutya, abhinaya, dialogue or vesha-bhushana. Other kalavidaru, Vishwanatha Adiga as ChandraHasa, Manjunath Gujjadi as Vishaye, Ambareesh Bhat as Madana, ChandraShekar Shetty Kodlaldi in Hasya also performed very well.

The story line is DushtaBuddhi, as the name indicates, selfish and evil mind minister in Subhuddi's Kunthala kingdom wants his son to be the King of the Kingdom. But a palace purohit informs him that a commoner child will likely to be the King. He sends the palace killers to finish the boy, but they did not do the job. The boy grows in the jungle and becomes the king of the place.

Dushtabuddhi ( Literally one with an evil mind), minister of king of Kuntala performed Annasantarpane, feeding of people.This boy also went there. The priests who had gathered there noticed the royal features of this boy and told the minister to take special care of the boy. But Dushtabuddhi had other evil designs as the king had no issues and the minister had plans of assuming the throne. In order to get rid of the boy he got some chandalas and ordered them to kill this boy, promising them suitable gifts. They took the boy to the forest to kill him. Before killing they asked him his last wish. Chandrahasa said that for the last time he would pray and worship the Shaligrama, which he used to keep always with him. He prayed and then asked the Chandalas why they want to kill him. However, chandalas kept quiet. All of a sudden, all the chandalas heard the roaring sound of a lion behind each of them and saw a lion jumping on them. Out of fear, they fainted when Chndrahasa helped them and gave them water to drink. Due to the fear of the lion-sight and behaviour of Chandrahasa their heart melted and they cut off only the sixth finger, and showed it to Dushtabuddhi as a proof of killing Chandrahasa. ( Note: the inauspicious sign of the boy was thus removed) Kulinda, king of the forest dwelling tribes saw this boy wandering and crying in the jungle, and as he had no issues of his own,brought him home and started bringing him up. Chandrahasa learnt all the aspects of education and won over all the provinces surrounding his kingdom, also added riches to the treasury. Once, when Dushtabuddhi visited their kingdom he recognized him and, having learnt the details from Kulinda,wrote a note to his son to poison him and sent the note to his son through Chandrahasa.

Chandrahasa came to Kuntala province and was resting in the garden in the outskirts of the town; Vishaye, daughter to Dushtabuddhi who had also come there with her maids chanced upon a sleeping chandrahasa and fell in love with him. She opened the letter addressed to her brother, recognized as her father’s note. She assumed that her father must have meant Vishaye and not visha ( meaning poison), promptly changed it and put it back in Chandrahasa’s pocket. Chandrahasa delivered the note to Madana, Dushtabuddhi’s son, was honoured and the wedding took place accordingly. Dushtabuddhi who arrived now was peeved. He commissioned murderers to wait and kill the person who will come to the Kalika temple in the outskirts of the town. (This temple is located in the town of Kuknur in North Karnataka today).He also prevailed upon chandrahasa to visit the temple in the evening, alone assuring him that was their custom. He also ensured chandrahasa would go to the temple. Madana, Dushtabuddhi’s son was looking after the affairs of the Palace in the absence of his father till now; it happened this day too. When he went to the Palace, the royal priest Galava informed him that the king was on his death bed and, having seen Chandrahasa earlier had decided he is the right choice as his son-in-law and heir; Madana was asked to convey this message Madana ran into chandrahasa, asked him to rush to the palace immediately and took his place to go the temple,was propmptly assassinated there by the murderers sent by Dushtabuddhi. Chandrahasa went to the Palace, was honoured and got married to the princess Champakamalini. When this news reached Dushtabuddhi, he was heart-broken. He was devastated when he learnt of his son’s death. He decided to end his life, went to the Kali temple and beheaded himself. When chandrahasa learnt of this twin tragedy in the morning, he went to the temple and prayed to goddess Kali to restore the two to life. When Kali was not appeased, he proceeded to behead himself; Kali appeared, restored the two to life, granted many boons to chandrahasa.(storyline taken from WikiPedia)Tuesday 23/2/2016